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Resource or Project Abstract

Metals occur naturally in seawater at low concentrations and some act as essential micronutrients for marine biota, but they become toxic when absorbed or ingested by plants and animals at high concentrations. Despite some recent research on metal contents in seaweeds from Ireland, few data exist regarding the metal contents in Irish coastal and transitional waters. The recent Discussion Document on a National Environmental Monitoring Programme for Transitional, Coastal and Marine Waters by the Environmental Protection Agency of Ireland proposes the inclusion of seaweeds in an extended assessment of metal concentrations future monitoring programs in Ireland and recommends the monitoring of hazardous substances and contaminants, including metals, by using biomonitoring organisms, such as shellfish and seaweeds. Currently no standardised monitoring protocol exists in Ireland, although some limited biomonitoring of metals using shellfish has been conducted. In this 3-year project, we observed seasonal, spatial and inter-site variations in phenol and metal (copper, zinc, cadmium, chromium) contents and in phenol composition in the ecologically and economically most important seaweeds in Ireland, Ascophyllum nodosum and Fucus vesiculosus, demonstrating their suitability as biomonitors of metal contamination. The experimental approach taken in this project established a quantitative link between physiological responses in intertidal brown seaweeds and phenol production, composition, exudation and their potential to bind metals under natural environmental conditions. The effect of copper enrichment and its interaction with salinity, and the effect of iron and zinc contamination were closely investigated. However, neither the intra-cellular phenol content of the seaweed, nor the phenol exudation could be used as biomarkers of metal contamination, whereas the cell-wall phenol content of brown seaweeds seems promising but needs further investigation. This project has produced data on the contaminative status of selected Irish coastal and transitional waters, including sites of active seaweed harvesting by the Irish seaweed industry. Finally some recommendations are proposed for the sampling methodology when using seaweeds as biomonitors of metal contamination, and some general comments on the utilisation of a series of biomonitors (seaweed, animal filter-feeder such as mussel, sediment) to characterise the metal contamination of a site in more detail.

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Number of Attached Files (Publicly and Openly Available for Download):

3

Project Start Date

Wednesday 1st March 2006 (01-03-2006)

Earliest Recorded Date within any attached datasets or digital objects

Tuesday 14th March 2006 (14-03-2006)

Most Recent Recorded Date within any attached datasets or digital objects

Geographical and Spatial Information Related To This Resource

Description of Geographical Characteristics of This Project or Dataset Ballyconneely (53°23.42N 10°02.47W) is a marine, moderately sheltered site, situated within the Connemara and facing the Atlantic Ocean with little anthropogenic impact. A. nodosum is harvested on this site for the Irish seaweed industry. Oranmore (53°16.15N 8°57.22W), Kinvara (53°08.28N 8°55.44W) and Finavara (53°09.25N 9°06.58W) are all situated within a Special Protection Area (SPA; Inner Galway Bay; SI No 349/1994) but they exhibit very different environment conditions. Oranmore and Kinvara are located in the inner part of the Bay and present higher nutrient enrichment than Finavara and contain mud on the lowest part of the shore. At Kinvara, a large fresh- ground- water river is emerging close to the castle and the sampling site resulting in dramatic changes of the salinity for the seaweed over a tide cycle: in few hours, this salinity varies between 32.6 at high tide down to 0.5 at low tide. On the other hand, Finavara is a typical marine site. In the industrialized Shannon Estuary, only Ringmoylan (52°40.09N 8°52.42W) is part of a SPA (River Shannon and River Fergus Estuaries; SI No 210/1997). This site is located in the inner part of the Estuary. Foynes (52°36.23N 9°09.26W) is situated in the middle part of the Estuary. At the entrance of the Estuary, Beal Point (52°34.77N 9°37.34W) and Carrig Island (52°34.35N 9°30.28W) are grouped as one site due to the absence of A. nodosum on Beal Point shore. The closest site in the estuary containing this seaweed species was Carrig Island. Cobh (51°51.41N 8°19.57W) is situated in the estuary of Cork Harbour, close to Passage West. It is influenced by anthropogenic impacts. The two sites in France were located in the Bay of Brest, Le Dellec (48°21.05N 4°34.11W) on the outer part of the Bay and Moulin Blanc (48°23.47N 4°25.24W) on the inner part of the Bay close to the nutrient enriched River Elorn and to the military and commercial harbours. At both sites only A. nodosum was present.

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Despite some recent research on metal contents in seaweeds from Ireland, few data exist regarding the metal contents in Irish coastal and transitional waters. The recent Discussion Document on a National Environmental Monitoring Programme for Transitional, Coastal and Marine Waters by the Environmental Protection Agency of Ireland proposes the inclusion of seaweeds in an extended assessment of metal concentrations future monitoring programs in Ireland and recommends the monitoring of hazardous substances and contaminants, including metals, by using biomonitoring organisms, such as shellfish and seaweeds.

Supplementary Information

Environmental parameters in the two French sites: data provided by Ifremer/Quadrige/REPOM hydrology for Moulin Blanc and ''Service d'Observation en Milieu Littoral, INSU-CNRS, Portzic? for le Dellec.

The authors would like to thank Dr Peter McLoughlin, Dr Brian Murphy, Dr Richard Walsh, Catherine Murphy and Adil Bakir (Estuarine Research Group, Waterford Institute of Technology) for their help with metal analyses; Dr Rachel Cave (Dept. of Earth and Ocean Science, NUIG) for her help with nutrient analyses; Dr Stephane Cerantola (NMR service laboratory, University of Western Brittany, France) for the NMR analyses; Dr Erwan Ar Gall (LEBHAM, University of Western Brittany, France) for the collection of seaweed samples from France; and John-Paul Tiernan and Sonya Welsh, undergraduate students who participated in the data collection.

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